Have you heard this joke before? I remember my sixth grade math teacher making us read this (why we were reading it in math class in totally beyond me). Basically it is this long winded joke about baseball players with funny names and miscommunication and humor. As smashingly famous as this joke is, I wanted to get it into your head today to illustrate a point.

First base is important. No matter what kind of pitch is thrown at you from the guy on the mound, your goal is to get to first. In order to reach any other base in the game, you have to touch first, right? Right. It is the objective, the goal, the beginning of a home run, and a means to an end, perhaps even the win of a game.

One of my friends used to use the phrase “make sure you’ve established your baseline” to me in college. She meant it in the sense that everything I needed to do or get prepped before I started my day/attempted to run to first, should already be in place. I can hit a great play and run to first base all I want, but if I haven’t had enough water, practiced sprints, over even tied my shoes, I’m not going to make it.

Who’s on first in your life? Who do you prepare your baseline for? Maybe it’s your family; they might have a lot of expectations and you make it our priority to please them. What about your teachers; they ask a lot of you and put a lot of pressure on you to be the best you can be. Your friends; they need your attention and support. Oh man, you sound really busy. I sound really busy too.

How about God; does He have expectations? What does He demand of you? Personally, I’d argue that God demands nothing from us. He asks us to love Him and to lead good lives. And that’s that.

Establishing your baseline with God in mind might look something like this: Striving to be a good person, praying daily, going to confession regularly, attending Mass on Sundays, and desiring Heaven. Is it easy to do these things? Maybe sometimes. For baseball players they might say that drinking water is pretty easy, but sprints aren’t their favorite. For me, going to Mass is pretty easy, but let’s be real, Confession isn’t always the easiest thing.

Like I said before, though, these things are necessary to establishing our baseline and at least getting on first base. Who’s on first in your life? Who are you orienting your training and efforts towards?